An annual boat parade dropped Christmas from its name, and lost about a third of its attendees, and at least one sponsor, in the process. Seems a “Boat Parade of Lights” just isn’t as popular as a “Christmas Boat Parade.” Kudos to Fireworks by Grucci for dropping their sponsorship. Despite the lower turnout,
Organizers say the parade still was a success.
I guess if you consider losing a third of your attendance a success. Assuming they continue kowtowing to political correctness, let’s wish them even more such success next year.
Another totally ineffective restraining order failed to provide any protection whatsoever, as a man killed his two children and injured his wife.
They said the man, Jorge Cruz Iraheta, and his estranged wife, Marta Iraheta, argued early Friday evening. The man had violated a restraining order by confronting his wife, police said.
The only good news? The guy killed himself, saving the taxpayers of California the cost of a trial and imprisonment.
Your safety is your responsibility.
Maybe, but you really have to dig for it. The often violent reaction of the radical left over California’s passage of Proposition 8 comes as no surprise to many of us. Liberals like to propound diversity and tolerance, but there’s one group toward whom they refuse to extend those ideals: social conservatives. Tolerance, to the left, generally means lending an ear to all opinions except those based upon traditional morality. There is a small flicker of light here.
[Bill] Condon, the gay writer-director of “Dreamgirls” and a Film Independent board member, offered this retort to what he calls the “off-with-his-head” crowd: “If you’re asking, ‘Do we take discrimination against gays as seriously as bigotry against African Americans and Jews?’ . . . the answer is, ‘Of course we do.’ But we also believe that some people, including Rich [Raddon], saw Prop. 8 not as a civil rights issue but a religious one. That is their right. And it is not, in and of itself, proof of bigotry.”
He is, of course, correct. California is one of the most liberal states in the nation, and yet a majority of voters agreed that it was wrong for their courts to impose a redefinition of marriage. I simply cannot be convinced that the majority of Californians hate gays. They simply believe there is something valuable to retaining the traditional definition of marriage. Let’s hope against hope that the rational voices on the left, such as Condon, prevail.
Your safety is your responsibility. An estranged husband barged into a small New Jersey church and killed his wife, injuring a couple other people in the process.
[…] active restraining orders had been issued in California and New Jersey against him after domestic violence complaints by his wife, who had moved recently to New Jersey.
Those orders obviously protected her, eh? If you need a restraining order, you need a plan for your own personal defense. The courts won’t protect you. The police won’t protect you. The responsibility really is yours.
[Note: the biggest mistake this woman made, sadly, was that she moved from one gun grabbing state to another. Both CA and NJ make it very difficult for people to legally provide for their own defense in public. She was obviously in danger and should have moved to a gun-friendly state where she could protect herself.]
Once more demonstrating that gun free zones aren’t we have a fatal shooting in a mall in Tukwila, WA. The Southcenter mall is owned by the Westfield Group, an international real estate giant whose shopping centers all have an official “no guns” policy. That worked really well today, now, didn’t it?
“Clearly, such a senseless act in our community heightens everyone’s state of awareness and concern. Our security precautions reflect that heightened state,” mall management said in an unsigned statement Sunday.
And those “security precautions” won’t do a single thing to make the mall safer. Thugs who have ignored the posted signs and mall cops to this point aren’t going to be swayed by more rules, more signs, or more flashlight-toting insecurity officers.
For those who think the police are the answer:
SWAT teams from all over Puget Sound converged on the mall, which was locked down for six hours. Store employees and customers were allowed to exit in groups and Murphy said the shooter “must have got out with the crowd.”
Yep. Loads of officers showed up but the perp got away. The police can’t be everywhere, folks, and by the time they do arrive, the damage has already been done. When the shooting starts, if you’re relying on the police for protection you’re already a victim. Safety, both public and private, begins with personal responsibility.
One round to the good guys. This is exactly the correct way to combat piracy. Kudos to the Indian Navy for taking their responsibility seriously. The Brits took out a pirate vessel a week ago, too. Her Majesty’s Navy is laudable, but don’t tell that to English bureaucrats. The marine director of the International Chamber of Shipping (London) would rather have the pirates arrested and taken to court. Why, exactly? The traditional penalty for piracy is death, a fitting end for these scum that would not be meted out by England’s legal system.
Some, however, aren’t getting the message. The CEO of a Norwegian shipping firm says his company will reroute their ships around the southern end of Africa, at significant expense. He bemoans the lack of action by international authorities but can’t seem to see the obvious solution: take responsibility for your own safety and arm your ships!
Choosing to settle a lawsuit over homosexual matchmaking, eHarmony has caved in to the gay “rights” movement. Some details of the settlement can be found in the article, but what bothers me most is the precedent. eHarmony has been one of the biggest success stories in online matchmaking, largely due to its foundation on Christian principles (note that doesn’t mean it caters only to Christians or somehow excludes other religions or atheists). It would have been better to follow the lead of the Catholic Church, which stopped providing adoption services in Massachusetts when that state required that the Church allow gays to use its services. eHarmony should have simply ceased accepting applicants from the state of New Jersey and closed its business there, taking the financial loss rather than compromising principle.